As hard as it is for the northern hemisphere to grin and bear the subzero temperatures this time of year, the season might be harder still for the southern hemisphere, where extreme heat can melt the internet.
Some Australians lost use of a number of  internet services on Jan. 5 because the air conditioning wasn’t working properly at an iiNet data center in the Western Australian city of Perth, according to a release from the company. The outages lasted from about 1 pm WST to 8 pm.
Internet users also turned to social media to complain about outages in Western Australia, South Australia and Victoria. iiNet, one of the country’s primary service providers, said in the statement that 98% of broadband users did not experience internet outages, though they may have been inconvenienced as iiNet turned off some email and account management systems for safety during that time.
Temperatures in Perth rose to 44 degrees Celsius (111 degrees Fahrenheit) on Monday, the hottest day in 24 years. At least today it’s cooled down to a pleasant 21.1 degrees (70 degrees Fahrenheit).